Right to Basic Education; Inclusive Education (Mainstreaming): Report on hearings by SA Human Rights Commission
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Meeting report
JOINT MONITORING COMMITTEE ON IMPROVEMENT OF QUALITY OF LIFE AND STATUS
OF CHILDREN, YOUTH AND DISABLED PERSONS
2 March 2007
RIGHT TO BASIC EDUCATION; INCLUSIVE EDUCATION (MAINSTREAMING): REPORT ON
HEARINGS BY SOUTH AFRICAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION
Chairperson: Ms W Newhoudt-Druchen (ANC)
Documents handed out:
SAHRC
presentation on Public Hearing
on the Right to Basic Education
SAHRC presentation
on Inclusive Education
SUMMARY
The South African Human Rights Commission reported on its findings from the
public hearings it had held on the right to a basic education. The finding was
that the right to a basic education was not being delivered and that teachers
lay at the heart of many of the problems. SAHRC recommended that the Department
of Education should have cut-off dates for the provision of infrastructure and
qualified teachers and that monitoring and evaluation systems should be set up.
With regard to inclusive education, the SAHRC found that this system was not
functioning, and recommended, among other things, that a dual system (inclusive
education and special needs education) be used and that the Department consult
with the disability sector. There was discussion in particular of children’s
direct voices, the gender disparity in the dropout rate and the need for
sensitivity training but all of the issues raised in the presentation were
discussed.
MINUTES
South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) report on the
Public Hearing on the Right to Basic Education, October 2005
Ms Judith Cohen, Parliamentary Officer: South African Human Rights Commission
(SAHRC) reported on, and made recommendations on the findings of the public
hearing on the right to basic education, held in October 2005. She made a
second presentation focusing specifically on the right of disabled children to
basic education. South Africa had made considerable strides in education but
her presentation focused on the challenges. The terms of reference took into
account the context of the right to basic education, the context within which the right is implemented and the
legislative and policy provisions. The hearing was limited to compulsory
education.
The framework used focused on four As:
• Availability
(legislative provisions, physical infrastructure, provisioning of teachers;
supply of teaching materials and aids)
•
Accessibility (non discriminatory physical and economic access)
• Acceptability
(the form and substance of education including curricula and teaching methods;
for example, the prohibition of corporal punishment; responding to teenage
pregnancy; respect for religious convictions; language of
instruction, safety)
• Adaptability
(the flexibility needed to respond to the ever-changing needs of our society
such as child-headed households, migrants, the disabled).
The finding was that quality education is not taking place in South Africa. The lived
daily reality at school for many children is incongruous with the legislation
and the policies of the Department. Poverty and dysfunctionality
reinforces exclusion within education. Education is unaffordable due to
school fees and other hidden costs. Many learners are hungry at school.
The drop-out rate of learners is concerning. There is too much violence and
abuse in our schools, including sexual abuse, gangsterism
and drugs, vandalism and corporal punishment. Basic resources such as
buildings, sanitation, water, electricity and telephones are lacking in some
schools. Teachers lie at the heart of many of the challenges. They lack passion
and a culture of learning and teaching, are not in the classroom enough, are
unqualified and under qualified, untrained to implement the new curriculum; use
old teaching methods; have too many children in their classes and are
disconnected from the community in which they teach.
The SAHRC recommended that:
• Mother-tongue language is needed as a medium of instruction.
• Fee-free
schools must be introduced rapidly.
• The school
dropout rate needs to be comprehensively understood and addressed.
• The state should be more active in ensuring compulsory school attendance. Access to quality education should not be
dependent on race, social class or geographic location.
• Poor learners who live far from their nearest school should receive
comprehensive state transport assistance in order to access education.
• Alternatives to the current models of School Governing Bodies (SGBs) must be explored and amendments made to the South
African Schools Act (SASA) if necessary. Many schools do not have adequately
functioning school governing bodies. Democratic participation by communities in
education is necessary in order to ensure that the social context is
appreciated and given the necessary space to influence the fulfillment of the
right to basic education.
• Districts need to be prioritised as the service
delivery vehicle of education. District offices are not viewed as being
supportive.
• The impact
of HIV/AIDS on education must be directly addressed within schools. The
education system needs to be more responsive to the challenges of children who
are infected and affected by HIV/AIDS
• Violence and abuse findings relate to accessibility and acceptability. There
must be dialogue between role-players and support of alternatives to corporal
punishment.
• Inclusivity was dealt with more comprehensively in
a separate presentation (see below).
• Poorer provinces spend less on education less than wealthier provinces. There
should be equitable provisioning between provinces.
• Minimum level of infrastructure provisioning, including libraries, should be
determined and implemented. A cut-off date must be set for this.
• There should also be a deadline for under or unqualified teachers. Teacher
morale should be addressed by all parties.
• Adequate and reliable support for monitoring and evaluation systems, to
inform the Department accurately about what is happening in schools and whether
quality educating is being delivered, do not exist and should be implemented.
Inclusive Education (Mainstreaming)
The
SAHRC found that inclusive education is not working. There is a lack of access
to education facilities for some learners with disabilities; anomalies in the
spread of LSEN (Learners with Special Education Needs) schools through
provinces; physical barriers, teacher incompetence and under-confidence. The
2001 White Paper on Inclusive Education supported mainstreaming but the disability
sector informed the Commission that schools do not accommodate children with
disabilities. Blind SA reported that provincial departments of education are
uncertain on how to implement the policy; the curriculum for blind learners is
inadequate in that it does not address blind learners’ specific learning needs
such as Braille skills, social skills and mobility training. There are
insufficient options being provided to parents. Rural learners who are blind
are not accommodated in the education system. There are no comprehensive
statistics on the number of blind and partially sighted learners upon which to
monitor and evaluate the provision of education. There is a lack of
consultation with the blind community on how to approach and deal with many of
these issues. More research is needed. DeafSA said
that the medical approach used to educate deaf learners in South Africa focuses
on speech training. This results in many deaf persons being functionally
illiterate. The Department fails to consult and engage sufficiently with the
deaf community. Deaf people are not provided with sufficient opportunities to
speak for themselves. Instead they are too often reliant on others who
interpret on their behalf. FEDSAS (Federation of Associations of Governing
Bodies of South African Schools) said that the White Paper is being interpreted
and applied differently throughout the country and that educators do not always
have the necessary knowledge to teach children with disabilities effectively.
This results in social exclusion rather than inclusion of learners with
disabilities within the classroom.
The SAHRC recommended that
• The
Department must consult regularly with the disability sector.
• The
Department needs to consult, monitor and research in order to determine those
places where the inclusive education is failing children. Where
learners are completely excluded from the system, creative measures must be
implemented with immediate effect
The
Department of Education had undertaken to engage with all of these
recommendations.
Discussion
Mr A Madella (ANC) asked whether children’s own
voices had been heard in the public hearings. He was of the opinion that
education should be compulsory up to the age of eighteen. He agreed that many
males dropped out of school because of antisocial activities such as gangsterism, especially in the Western Cape. He wondered
whether the provincial education departments still employed truancy officers.
Mainstreaming learners with disabilities without providing infrastructure and
other assistance for them in schools is a problem. Special schools’ finance had
been cut because all of these learners were expected to attend mainstream
schools but no provision had been made for learners with special needs in
mainstream schools. Transport and many other factors could be a barrier to
mainstreaming. At the Eros School in
Cape Town, 2006 was the last year the school could offer Grade 12. The future
for the Eros learners would be a disability grant at the end of Grade 11.
Disability-sensitivity training would also be needed if disabled learners were
to attend mainstream schools because children could be ‘unintentionally cruel’.
Ms E Ngaleka (ANC) saw the higher enrolment rate of
girls as a positive sign; why did the SAHRC view it negatively? Who were
defined as role players and invited to hearings? The SAHRC had reported that SGBs worked in former Model C schools only; would it not be
better to educate parents more, rather than abandon the system?
Mr M Moss (ANC) asked whether any parents had been prosecuted for denying their
children the right to education. SGBs had much power
and should ensure that communities were involved in addressing the challenges
facing education. The section 29 right to education in the Constitution
includes mass and Adult Basic Education and Training (ABET); much remained to
be done in that area.
Mr D Gamede (ANC) wanted to know where public
hearings were held.
Ms H Weber (DA) emphasised that SGBs needed training.
One SGB had dismissed a teacher without ensuring compliance with the legal
conditions for dismissal. The teacher had appealed to the Council for
Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) and the SGB had had goods taken
by the sheriff.
Deaf and blind learners needed Early Childhood Development (ECD) more than
other learners.
The public needed to be sensitised to the disability.
Was there any data on attendance at schools with successful feeding schemes?
The Chair asked for clarity on the high drop-out rate between Grades One and
Three (26%). Could the higher drop-out rate for boys be because most primary
school teachers were women and male role models in school were lacking?
SAHRC Commissioner, Mr Tom Manthatha, said that it
was difficult to hear children at public hearings because ‘kids don’t talk to
their parents’ so the children’s voices referred to were ‘academic, not real’.
In general, he ascribed a large part of the challenges facing education to the
under development of communities: if schools became a community asset, much
progress would be made.
Ms Cohen added that it was essential to hear children’s voices in evaluating
the delivery of children’s rights. Learners had testified and much research
that was based on in-depth work with children had been referred to in drawing
up the report. Role players included national and provincial government,
non-government organsiations, parents, learners,
unions, academics, SGB federations, school associations and others. The terms
of reference were first published in the Government Gazette and then
distributed as widely as possible. The public hearings on the child’s right to
education had taken place in Johannesburg, the hearings into school-based
violence had taken place in the Western Cape and the hearings on conditions on
farms had taken place at many venues. The SAHRC was limited by staff
constraints.
The issue of school dropouts was very controversial and ‘everyone wants to talk
about it’. Academics and the Department of Education staff had been unable to
agree on terminology. The Net Enrolment Rate (NER) was 97% of all children of
school-going age so the number, if not the proportion, of dropouts was high.
Very little was known about this group but some speculated that they were the
disabled.
Ms Cohen was also pleased that more girls than boys were attending school but
the findings should be interrogated to find out if boys were dropping out to be
antisocial. The high dropout rate in Grades One to Three was due to learners
registering, dropping out and re-registering but it stabilised from Grade Three
to Grade 10, when it increased again. She agreed with Mr Moss that education
should not be limited by gender or age. In answer to Ms Weber’s question,
school-feeding schemes did not always run well. Children arrived at school
hungry, with their parents believing that they would receive a meal at school
and often this did not happen. The Department would first have to get the
system running better before impact could be investigated.
Sensitivity training was of the utmost importance. South Africans should have
the morals and values that led them to treat all others with respect. Children
lacked male role models particularly, which was one of he causes of male
violence.
Mr Gamede said that populations of the Eastern Cape, Limpopo and KwaZulu-Natal were
most important because a ten-kilometre walk to school was common and that the
public hearings should have been held there. Also, corporal punishment had been
abolished but schools gave learners detention, which was mental, not physical,
torture. And had the education playing fields been levelled if untrained
teachers and infrastructure backlogs existed in the poorer areas only? He said
that school principals forced learners to drop from the higher grade to the
standard grade to improve the pass rate. He asked if it was really practical to
set a deadline for the provision of minimum infrastructure.
Mr L Nzimande (ANC) went to a special school (for
blind learners) and doubted whether that system was the best as “kids died
there”. They never had Braille books and used older books than mainstream
schools. He and his peers had tried to kill a boarding master because they
learned violence at school. It was very important to hear learners. The
environment was not conducive to education, learners dropped out of school
because of lack of support. Was the office to advocate support of disabled
children being established and what had become of Section 5 committees?
The Chair agreed that the education of deaf learners was as appalling as that
of blind learners. She said that she was not welcome at deaf schools because
she investigated abuse.
Ms Ngaleka asked if low teacher morale could be
attributed to the impact of HIV AIDS on them.
The Chair asked if there was research on the number of remedial teachers in
schools; was there one-to-one support for ADHD and dyslexic learners in
mainstream classes? She commented that non-payment of fees lead to
psychological abuse because teachers told learners that they must be stupid if
their parents could not pay fees. She wanted to know if teacher training
encompassed sensitivity training. She was aware of a lack of funding at one
school. How did the Department respond? She had lived in Washington where the
schools had security fences and metal detectors – was that practice researched?
Would truancy officers be re-introduced? The communities needed to examine that
issue.
Ms Cohen responded that teachers felt that the prohibition of corporal
punishment left a vacuum. There was training and a booklet but teachers found
it difficult to change, especially because parents used corporal punishment. It
was an emotional issue, like abortion and the death penalty.
The playing fields were not level; just as there were two economies, there were
two education systems. There should be targets for infrastructure provision but
it was difficult to prioritise – a vandalised school or a community with no
school? The deaf community had spoken the most about social ills and abuse at
special schools. There should be both mainstreaming and special schools, not
either/or. Parents should have a choice, depending on the child’s ability.
The SAHRC had held hearings on school-based violence and would release its
findings before the end of the year. The lack of school psychologists had
emerged there.
The impact of HIV on teacher morale had been examined by the Human Sciences
Research Council who had released a report on the topic. HIV/AIDS was one of
the many factors contributing to low teacher morale. She recommended this
report and Emerging Voices, on rural education, released by the Nelson Mandela
Foundation.
Regarding the issue of an office for disabled children, she said that the SAHRC
would have senior co-ordinators for children and the disabled, older people,
people with HIV and refugees. It had been found that one person for children
and the disabled had been too much of a workload. Section 5 committees had gone
out of favour but one remained for parliamentary meetings.
Mr Manthatha said that the educational environment
issue was most important. So was discipline. Some communities blamed human
rights education for lack of discipline in learners. WE should guide one
another and put our heads together. He agreed that there should have been
hearings in Limpopo and other provinves
but the SAHRC was understaffed.
Mr Madella said that it was good that the Department
of Education had responded to the recommendations. Would the SAHRC revert back
to the Department after a period?
Ms Cohen answered that the SAHRC was still scrutinising the Department’s
responses to the recommendations and would follow up. She thanked the Committee
for their time and said that she had heard two key issues – disability and the
drop-out rate.
Mr Moss said that west coast schools had been integrated three years previously
but coloured learners preferred to remain at the larger formerly coloured
school instead of going to the formerly white school. Did those dynamics exist
in other communities?
Mr Manthatha agreed and said that black learners also
went to formerly white schools and found language and cultural barriers there
too.
All the members of the Committee expressed their gratitude for the
presentations and the meeting was adjourned.
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